Biomedical subjects

Colette R Hirsch

Publications and source records attributed to Colette R Hirsch.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Inducing an interpretation bias changes self-imagery: a preliminary investigation.

Prior work suggests that variations in self-imagery can influence the emotional interpretations people make about social situations. The current experiment investigated the converse possibility: that inducing an inferential bias can change the content of self-related images. The effects of repeated practice in accessing either negative or positive social outcomes was tested by having participants report on self-images generated during subsequent experience with ambiguous social situations. Participants and independent judges rated the content of participants' self-images as being more negative after prior practice in accessing negative rather than positive social outcomes. Furthermore, participants who practiced accessing negative outcomes rated their anticipated anxiety in an imagined stressful social situation as being greater, and their expected social performance as poorer than participants in the positive outcome group. Groups did not differ in state anxiety levels when making their ratings, so it is unlikely that any observed differences between groups can be attributed to mood effects. We suggest that this finding is consistent with the hypothesis that inferential biases and content of self-images can interact with each other and may together serve to maintain social anxiety.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2006

Imagery and interpretations in social phobia: support for the combined cognitive biases hypothesis.

Cognitive-behavioral models of clinical problems typically postulate a role for the combined effects of different cognitive biases in the maintenance of a given disorder. It is striking therefore that research has tended to examine cognitive biases in isolation rather than assessing how they work together to maintain psychological dysfunction. The combined cognitive biases hypothesis presented here suggests that cognitive biases influence each another and can interact to maintain a given disorder. Furthermore, it is proposed that the combined effects of cognitive biases may have a greater impact on sustaining a given disorder than if the biases operated in isolation. The combined cognitive biases hypothesis is examined in relation to imagery and interpretation in social phobia. Individuals with social phobia experience negative images of themselves performing poorly in social situations, and they also interpret external social information in a less positive way than those without social anxiety. Evidence of a reciprocal relationship between imagery and interpretations is presented, and the mechanisms underlying the combined effects are discussed. Clinical implications and the potential utility of examining the combined influence of other cognitive biases are highlighted.

Affective Symptoms↗

PubMed2006

The causal role of negative imagery in social anxiety: a test in confident public speakers.

This study tests the causal role of negative self-imagery in social anxiety. Low public-speaking anxious volunteers rehearsed a negative self-image, a positive self-image or a control image prior to giving a speech. As predicted, the negative image group felt more anxious, believed they performed less well and reported more negative thoughts than the positive image group. These findings do not appear to be due to changes in state anxiety, since they remained unchanged when anxiety was controlled in an analysis of covariance. The negative image group also reported more anxiety than the control group. Given that participants do not currently have anxiety problems, the findings are consistent with the idea that negative self-imagery has a causal role in the development and maintenance of social anxiety.

Affect↗

PubMed2004

Information-processing bias in social phobia.

Social phobia is a persistent disorder that is unlikely to be maintained by avoidance alone. One reason for the enduring nature of social phobia may be the way individuals with the disorder process social information. It is important for those involved in social phobia to have an understanding of information-processing biases, because it has the potential to guide psychological interventions. In this review of social phobia, probability and cost estimates of social situations are examined, interpretive biases are evaluated and findings relating to memory and negative imagery are also reviewed. The clinical implications of social-phobia-related information-processing biases are discussed and possible avenues for future research are outlined.

Autobiographies as Topic↗

PubMed2004

Negative self-imagery in social anxiety contaminates social interactions.

Patients with social phobia report experiencing negative images of themselves performing poorly when in feared social situations. The present study investigates whether such negative self-imagery (based on memory of past social situations) contaminates social interactions. High socially anxious volunteers participated in two conversations with another volunteer (conversational partner). During one conversation, the socially anxious volunteers held in mind a negative self-image, and during the other they held in mind a less negative (control) self-image. As predicted, when holding the negative image the socially anxious volunteers felt more anxious, reported using more safety behaviours, believed that they performed more poorly, and showed greater overestimation of how poorly they came across (relative to ratings by the conversational partner). Conversational partners rated the socially anxious volunteers' performance as poorer in the negative image condition. Furthermore, the conversation was contaminated since both groups of participants rated its quality as poorer in the negative image condition.

Analysis of Variance↗

PubMed2003

Self-images play a causal role in social phobia.

Patients with social phobia often experience negative self-images in social situations. The current study investigated whether negative self-images have a causal role in maintaining social phobia. Patients with social phobia participated twice in a conversation with a stranger, once whilst holding their usual negative self-image in mind and once whilst holding a less negative (control) self-image in mind, with order counterbalanced across participants. Compared to the control image condition, when participants held the negative image in mind they experienced greater anxiety, rated their anxiety symptoms as being more visible, and rated their performance as poorer. An assessor who did not know which image was being held also rated participants' anxiety as more evident and their behaviour as less positive when the negative image was being held in mind. Finally, when participant and assessor ratings were compared, participants underestimated their performance and overestimated the visibility of their anxiety to a significantly greater extent in the negative imagery condition. Taken together, these results support the hypothesis that negative self-imagery has a causal role in maintaining social phobia.

Adult↗